Chapter X.—The Opinion of the Apostles on Veiling the Mysteries of the Faith.

Rightly, therefore, the divine apostle says,
“By revelation the mystery was made known to me (as I wrote before
in brief, in accordance with which, when ye read, ye may understand my
knowledge in the mystery of Christ), which in other ages was not made
known to the sons of men, as it is now revealed to His holy apostles
and prophets.”30523052Eph. iii. 3–5. For there is an instruction of the
perfect, of which, writing to the Colossians, he says, “We cease
not to pray for you, and beseech that ye may be filled with the knowledge
of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that ye may walk
worthy of the Lord to all pleasing; being fruitful in every good work,
and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might
according to the glory of His power.”30533053Col. i. 9–11. And again he says,
“According to the disposition of the grace of God which is given
me, that ye may fulfil the word of God; the mystery which has been hid
from ages and generations, which now is manifested to His saints: to whom
God wished to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery
among the nations.”30543054Col. i. 25–27. So that, on the one hand, then, are
459the mysteries which were hid till the
time of the apostles, and were delivered by them as they received from
the Lord, and, concealed in the Old Testament, were manifested to the
saints. And, on the other hand, there is “the riches of the glory
of the mystery in the Gentiles,” which is faith and hope in Christ;
which in another place he has called the “foundation.”30553055Col. i. 27. And
again, as if in eagerness to divulge this knowledge, he thus writes:
“Warning every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man
(the whole man) perfect in Christ;” not every man simply, since
no one would be unbelieving. Nor does he call every man who believes in
Christ perfect; but he30563056
[Elucidation VI.] says all the man,
as if he said the whole man, as if purified in body and soul. For that
the knowledge does not appertain to all, he expressly adds: “Being
knit together in love, and unto all the riches of the full assurance
of knowledge, to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God in Christ, in
whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge.”30573057Col. ii. 2, 3.
“Continue in prayer, watching therein with thanksgiving.”30583058Col. iv. 2. And
thanksgiving has place not for the soul and spiritual blessings alone,
but also for the body, and for the good things of the body. And he still
more clearly reveals that knowledge belongs not to all, by adding:
“Praying at the same time for you, that God would open to us a
door to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am bound; that I may
make it known as I ought to speak.”30593059Col. iv. 3, 4. For there were certainly,
among the Hebrews, some things delivered unwritten. “For when
ye ought to be teachers for the time,” it is said, as if they
had grown old in the Old Testament, “ye have again need that one
teach you which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are
become such as have need of milk, and not of solid food. For every one
that partaketh of milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness; for
he is a babe, being instructed with the first lessons. But solid food
belongs to those who are of full age, who by reason of use have their
senses exercised so as to distinguish between good and evil. Wherefore,
leaving the first principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on
to perfection.”30603060Heb. v. 12, 13, 14; vi. 1.

Barnabas, too, who in person preached the word
along with the apostle in the ministry of the Gentiles, says, “I
write to you most simply, that ye may understand.” Then below,
exhibiting already a clearer trace of gnostic tradition, he says,
“What says the other prophet Moses to them? Lo, thus saith the
Lord God, Enter ye into the good land which the Lord God sware, the God
of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob; and ye received for an inheritance
that land, flowing with milk and honey.”30613061 [Ex. xxxiii. 1; Lev. xx. 24. S.] What says
knowledge? Learn, hope, it says, in Jesus, who is to be manifested to you
in the flesh. For man is the suffering land; for from the face of the
ground was the formation of Adam. What, then, does it say in reference
to the good land, flowing with milk and honey? Blessed be our Lord,
brethren, who has put into our hearts wisdom, and the understanding
of His secrets. For the prophet says, “Who shall understand the
Lord’s parable but the wise and understanding, and he that loves
his Lord?” It is but for few to comprehend these things. For it
is not in the way of envy that the Lord announced in a Gospel, “My
mystery is to me, and to the sons of my house;” placing the election
in safety, and beyond anxiety; so that the things pertaining to what
it has chosen and taken may be above the reach of envy. For he who has
not the knowledge of good is wicked: for there is one good, the Father;
and to be ignorant of the Father is death, as to know Him is eternal
life, through participation in the power of the incorrupt One. And to be
incorruptible is to participate in divinity; but revolt from the knowledge
of God brings corruption. Again the prophet says: “And I will
give thee treasures, concealed, dark, unseen; that they may know that
I am the Lord.”30623062Isa. xlv. 3.
Similarly David sings: “For, lo, Thou hast loved truth; the
obscure and hidden things of wisdom hast Thou showed me.”30633063Ps. li. 6, Sept.
“Day utters speech to day”30643064Ps. xix. 2, 3. (what is clearly written),
“and night to night proclaims knowledge” (which is hidden
in a mystic veil); “and there are no words or utterances whose
voices shall not be heard” by God, who said, “Shall one do
what is secret, and I shall not see him?”

Wherefore instruction, which reveals hidden things,
is called illumination, as it is the teacher only who uncovers the lid of
the ark, contrary to what the poets say, that “Zeus stops up the jar
of good things, but opens that of evil.” “For I know,”
says the apostle, “that when I come to you, I shall come in the
fulness of the blessing of Christ;”30653065Rom. xv. 29. designating the spiritual
gift, and the gnostic communication, which being present he desires to
impart to them present as “the fulness of Christ, according to
the revelation of the mystery sealed in the ages of eternity, but now
manifested by the prophetic Scriptures, according to the command of the
eternal God, made known to all the nations, in order to the obedience
of faith,” that is, those
460of the nations who believe that it
is. But only to a few of them is shown what those things are which are
contained in the mystery.

Rightly then, Plato, in the Epistles, treating of
God, says: “We must speak in enigmas; that should the tablet come
by any mischance on its leaves either by sea or land, he who reads may
remain ignorant.” For the God of the universe, who is above all
speech, all conception, all thought, can never be committed to writing,
being inexpressible even by His own power. And this too Plato showed,
by saying: “Considering, then, these things, take care lest some
time or other you repent on account of the present things, departing in
a manner unworthy. The greatest safeguard is not to write, but learn; for
it is utterly impossible that what is written will not vanish.”

Akin to this is what the holy Apostle Paul says,
preserving the prophetic and truly ancient secret from which the teachings
that were good were derived by the Greeks: “Howbeit we speak
wisdom among them who are perfect; but not the wisdom of this world,
or of the princes of this world, that come to nought; but we speak the
wisdom of God hidden in a mystery.”306630661 Cor. ii. 6, 7. Then proceeding, he thus
inculcates the caution against the divulging of his words to the multitude
in the following terms: “And I, brethren, could not speak to you
as to spiritual, but as to carnal, even to babes in Christ. I have fed
you with milk, not with meat: for ye were not yet able; neither are
ye now able. For ye are yet carnal.”306730671 Cor. iii. 1–3.

If, then, “the milk” is said
by the apostle to belong to the babes, and “meat”
to be the food of the full-grown, milk will be understood to be
catechetical instruction—the first food, as it were, of
the soul. And meat is the mystic contemplation; for this is the
flesh and the blood of the Word, that is, the comprehension of
the divine power and essence. “Taste and see that the Lord
is Christ,”30683068Ps. xxxiv. 8; according to the reading Χριστός
for χρηστός.
it is said. For so He imparts of Himself to those who partake of such
food in a more spiritual manner; when now the soul nourishes itself,
according to the truth-loving Plato. For the knowledge of the divine
essence is the meat and drink of the divine Word. Wherefore also Plato
says, in the second book of the Republic, “It is those that
sacrifice not a sow, but some great and difficult sacrifice,” who
ought to inquire respecting God. And the apostle writes, “Christ
our passover was sacrificed for us;”306930691 Cor. v. 7.—a sacrifice hard to
procure, in truth, the Son of God consecrated for us.